Derek

First project of 2025 done! My GTI was starting to leak a pretty significant amount of coolant from the water pump area and under the reservoir once the system warmed up and got pressurized. The reservoir was an easy replacement, but I wasn’t able to see the exact spot of the water pump leak due to it being up behind a PS pump bracket and it only leaking when the car was running and hot. I decided to just do it all, and the car got a new water pump, housing, seals and thermostat housing.

Upon disassembly of the old water pump off of the car, I think I found the reason for the leak - the original plastic thermostat housing had started to warp! I actually had just done a water pump on my black 85 Jetta GLI at the beginning of last year because of this exact same fault. All of the new replacements out there are also plastic, but the ones off of older VWs like Rabbits and A1 Jettas (which use the same water pump) are metal. I learned this while doing it on my 85, so since then I’ve started collecting the metal thermostat housings whenever I found them in junkyards, so I’d have them on hand whenever the plastic ones failed on my A2s. Now my GTI has a full metal water pump assembly, and hopefully won’t ever have this issue again!

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